There weren't that many books in our house when I was a child. We certainly didn't have shelves full of them. As an avid reader I visited the library. You were permitted to borrow two books a week and no more. I read both in two days.
Now I can have a library of up to 3500 books in my pocket. Surely this is the biggest explosion of the accessibility of books since public libraries began? That's great for readers and great for writers.
I read an article recently where the writer indicated that they bought their books second hand from Amazon. Hey, they were recycling. So do/did I, but I felt bad about it because although cheaper (and supporting a second hand books industry) the author got nothing from the sale. Shouldn't I buy them new?
Kindle solves that problem for me. I buy a copy, (often cheaper than second hand) and the author gets the money, if they've been sensible enough to put the book up themselves. Otherwise they get royalties from their publisher (although probably not enough - see previous post).
And what about all those good books that are no longer readily available? Well-loved, but now out of print. Not any more. I know. I've downloaded a few.
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